


fortune's fools

by dramaturgicallycorrect



Category: One Direction (Band)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Vampire, Alternate Universe - Werewolf, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-10-27
Updated: 2017-02-26
Packaged: 2018-08-27 09:22:24
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 8,328
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8396221
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/dramaturgicallycorrect/pseuds/dramaturgicallycorrect
Summary: It's about respecting the night and the reason they've come together. It's a rite of passage, as it were, a symbol of status, and that's the only thing that keeps Louis from skiving off and going for a run with Liam. 

  And he knows Lottie would chew off his left arm if he kept her away from the first All Hallows' Ball she's eligible for. So he keeps himself plastered to her side as soon as they step into the foyer, works hard at keeping his claws at bay once they're behind enemy lines. It’s a hard habit to unlearn, but he’s trying.

  Louis likes an armistice as much as the next lad, but until he sees some sort formal treaty, he generally trusts the vamps about as far as he can throw them. Which is, admittedly, quite far, but not far enough. He's here to represent the pack, and that's all. He won't pick a fight. But he will finish one if it starts, he has to. The war resumes at sunrise anyway.
 [Or two immortal households, both alike in dignity.]





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> "I need to take a break from writing about werewolves." - a lie I told myself four days ago.
> 
> This is inspired by [these incredible tags.](https://wickershire.tumblr.com/post/152321475068/skatetoughs-left-side-is-vampires-harry-and)

 

It's about respecting the night and the reason they've come together. It's a rite of passage, as it were, a symbol of status, and that's the only thing that keeps Louis from skiving off and going for a run with Liam.

And he knows Lottie would chew off his left arm if he kept her away from the first All Hallows' Ball she's eligible for. So he keeps himself plastered to her side as soon as they step into the foyer, works hard at keeping his claws at bay once they're behind enemy lines. It’s a hard habit to unlearn, but he’s trying.

Louis likes an armistice as much as the next lad, but until he sees some sort formal treaty, he generally trusts the vamps about as far as he can throw them. Which is, admittedly, quite far, but not far enough. He's here to represent the pack, and that's all. He won't pick a fight. But he will finish one if it starts, he has to. The war resumes at sunrise anyway.

It’s always a big do when it’s hosted by one of _them_ , breaking out the diamond encrusted goblets to sip tepid blood from, condescending to provide a couple dozen bottles of Cristal for the wolves. Louis’ got money enough now, having won all his challenges and secured his rank in the pack, enough to take care of all his family, but. He’s not shoving anyone’s face in it.

Louis takes a flute of champagne that’s offered to Lottie by a young serving girl with glassy eyes and a rigid back. The girl grins at Lottie mechanically and Lottie grins back, her nose not strong enough to catch the scent of her poisoned blood to know what she is. Human. Enthralled.

He waits until the girl shuffles away from them before he scents out for wolfsbane or a trace of silver. He hands the flute to Lottie when he’s satisfied.

They work their way across the foyer to the wolf side, following the natural division that’ll extend through the rest of the manor. They're meant to mingle with each other, but they always stand on opposing sides. Like prepubescent kids at a school dance. Or the Jets and the Sharks.

“What's it that water doesn't mix with?” he asks as soon as he takes his place beside Liam where he stands by the garish statue that looks a bit like tentacle porn. Louis snaps his fingers along with the melody from the string quartet that drifts idly through the house. He’s not in tempo, or anything, he’s just got a mind on the Jets and the Sharks.

“Blood?” Liam guesses.

“Nah, that's not it.”

Lottie levels them both with an unimpressed look. “Oil.”

“That's the one,” Louis says with another specific snap of his fingers, just as he finds what he's looking for across the room. Who he's looking for. “We’re like oil and water,” he says quietly.

Harry looks frigid in his black suit, the undead bastard. His shirt’s unbuttoned a vulnerable amount, exposing a smooth chest that could do with a claw mark or two etched into it. Harry blinks lazily at the poor sod who’s wasting their time chatting animatedly at him, his posture indicating he’d rather be anyplace else in the world besides here. Louis gets that -- he absolutely gets that -- but he’s not the one throwing the bloody party.

“Is that -- ” Lottie whispers.

“Harry Styles,” Louis fills in, just as Lottie’s breathing, “Gemma Styles.”

Louis presses his lips together, nearly having given himself away. He doesn’t have to look over at Liam to see him scowling into his glass of champagne at the thought of either of them.

Gemma is, incidentally, standing next to Harry, the two of them wearing matched looks of disinterest. Louis notices for the first time exactly how platinum her hair color looks compared to Lottie’s -- a recent change for Lottie that he’s beginning to suspect has nothing to do with her affinity for Daenerys Targaryen.

“She looks like a _queen_.”

“She is a queen,” Louis says blandly. “Or she will be.”

He reckons she’s got more of a regal look to her, more than can be said for her brother, slouched and tousled and looking half asleep. Louis bottles that thought up quickly before he falls down that rabbit hole, never to return.

“Shall we?” Louis asks, gesturing further into the manor. The foyer is starting to become too crowded as more and more arrive fashionably late, and Louis is starting to mix up his scents. Too many heartbeats that aren’t pack, too many bodies without heartbeats at all.

“My _god_ ,” Lottie nearly shouts as soon as they work their way into the ballroom. Her wide eyes trace the dark fabric draping out across the room from the big fucking chandelier at the center of the ceiling. The fabric drapes down the walls, over the windows, enough to block out the sun when it's up.

Louis surveys the ballroom as well, almost sickened just with the thought that this manor _has_ a ballroom. There are vampire eyes staring at the two of them, their lips turned down in disgust at her enthusiasm. He might have shushed her himself if he hadn’t seen them judge her. Louis growls a warning until they look away.

“It's a bit much, isn't it.” He puts a hand to her back and safely guides her to the wolf side of the room.

“It's fantastic,” she gushes. Everything does glitter in the soft light; the walls are lined with large portraits and tapestries. It looks sterile, like a museum, not warm like a home.  

She'll learn. No vampire ever wandered through a den with awe. They’re usually sniffing about how dirty it seems, making snide comments about how they always thought wolves lived in caves in a forest, like they’d never imagined they could own houses. The Tomlinson den might not be as posh as all this, but it is a home. It’s warm and you don’t feel like you have to whisper.

Louis shrugs a shoulder at her. “Do enough of these, the shine’ll wear off.”

“It is ostentatious, I suppose,” grumbles a deep and familiar voice from behind him. Louis almost fights it, knows Harry’s positioned himself specifically so they'll have to give their attention to him, so Harry knows he's taken it. Louis doesn’t like to be snuck up on, not in the slightest, and maybe that’s the worst skill of a vampire.

Lottie turns first because she doesn't know any better, so Louis turns with her. Liam follows Louis’ lead, deferring to his superior and likely irritable about it. It’s three wolves against one vampire, and it still feels like an unfair fight. Mostly because it’s Harry.

“Ostentatious, yeah,” Louis agrees easily. “Is that your vocabulary word of the day?”

“You must be the new addition to the Yorkshire pack,” Harry says lightly, with eyes only for Lottie. He draws up her hand and presses a kiss to it. “I’m Harry.”

“Lottie,” she says. She doesn’t know he already knows.

“Lottie, this house has been in my family for generations, I suspect not much has changed in hundreds of years.” His eyes sweep across the room briefly before they return to meet Louis’. “Other than the type of creatures we let in.”

Liam stiffens next to him, his chin lifting ever so. Louis steps forward to Harry so Liam knows to stand down.

Harry looks him up and down, something slow and dirty in his appraisal. Louis’ cheeks don’t heat, but it’s a near thing. “Nice t-shirt,” Harry decides.

Louis swallows a laugh. He's not gonna get all laced up for this sort of bullshit. At least this shirt’s clean. “Nice grimace.”

“Do you like what you see?” Harry asks, still too disaffected to be pleased by it. Louis knows better.

“Not exactly the _aesthetic_ I’d go for,” Louis says, dropping his voice to mock Harry’s for _aesthetic_. The kind of pretentious bullshit he’d say, has said.

Harry tilts his head. “And what aesthetic is that?”

“Dead inside.”

Harry’s jaw works over a response like gum in his mouth. In the end, he says nothing, his face smooths over into something empty again. Louis wonders if he’s taken it too far for once.

“I must tend to my guests,” Harry says, after a minute of uncomfortable silence. “Please excuse me.” He sweeps away quickly, the back of his head visible over much of the crowd for a few moments before he disappears altogether.

Liam shivers as soon as he’s gone. “That was disgusting.”

“That was hot,” Lottie laughs. “He’s well fit.”

“ _Lottie_ ,” Liam hisses. “Their type, they’ve got -- there’s something in them, some sort of charm. Never let your guard down. They’ll kill you quick as look at you, and you’ll go to your grave thanking them for the opportunity.”

Lottie’s lips purse like a proper Tomlinson, arching an eyebrow. “That sounds awfully closed minded of you, Liam. Honestly, it's the 21st century.”

“They started it.” Liam tosses back the last of his champagne.

Louis hums, never quite vocalizing the nagging suspicion in the back of his mind that no one remembers who started the war, really. He’s seen the worst in vampires, fought the worst of them, but he knows wolves have done their fair share in return. Shit escalates and both sides think they’re retaliating against a slight, neither side thinks they’re on the offense.

They’re rich fucks, vampires, pretentious fucks, sure, but. He recalls the way Harry’s face fell. “Maybe we should finish it.”

“Too right we should,” Liam says, agreeing for quite another reason altogether.

Louis looks around the ballroom. It’s a sad fucking party, and Louis has to spend -- he checks his phone -- about four more hours here. His eyes latch on Harry again as soon as he finds him, watching him bent slightly to speak to one of their servants, a bloke with the same glassy look as the girl that served them earlier.

He’s got his neck bared to Harry, tugging his collar down so much that it’s dislodging his black bow tie. Harry’s frowning at him, tugging at the boy’s hand until he lets go of his collar. He reaches for the goblet in the boy’s hand instead, but the boy just tugs at his collar again.

Louis looks away.

It’s a long fucking night, as time drags on, Lottie’s enthusiasm flags. She’d dressed herself up, spent weeks talking up how excited she was. He hadn’t the heart to tell her it’d be exactly like this. Formal, perfunctory, dead. Like most vampires. He wouldn’t have wanted that for her, to have her heart broken the moment she comes of age, to become as jaded as the rest of them. The truth hurts, but that’s not good enough for her. She deserves something better.

“D’you fancy a dance, Lots?”

“To the Debussy?”

Louis frowns. “No, to the music.”

Lottie pauses, sighing at him, and she says, “Yeah, go on.”

He grabs her hand and gives her a spin, swaying her into the large gulf in the middle of the ballroom between the two species. He can hear Liam hissing after him, but he ignores it. He’s not quite certain how to dance to this sort of thing, so they try their best. What they lack in skill, they more than make up for in enthusiasm. And, shockingly, there’s absolutely no love from the audience at all for most of the song.

They’re joined suddenly, a pair dancing far more formally, excellent technique, if Louis’ learned anything from _Strictly_. Of course it’s Harry, twirling Gemma effortlessly around the dancefloor. There’s murmuring then, but not enough that any of the rest of them join the two pairs, and they ride out their tidal wave of awkwardness until the string quartet brings the song to a close.

“The Tommos are in the house!” Louis says with a clap of his hands, circling around the band. “Let’s get this party started, shall we? Excuse me.” Louis comes to a stop right in front of the violinist. “Do you know any Rihanna?”

The violinist looks scandalized. He turns away from Louis and the band strikes up again, something decidedly not Rihanna or any of her pals.

“I tried,” Louis tells Lottie, his eyes widening cheekily.

“You sure did,” she answers, and a smile finds its way back to her face. So that’s his job done.

A nervous girl with a camera slides her way in front of them. There’s enough fear in her eyes that Louis takes pity on her, doesn’t offer to spin her around the ballroom as well in any sort of attempt to lighten the damn mood.

“Ehmmm, photo of the Yorkshire… pack representatives?” the photographer asks, almost as though she regrets it actively as she’s saying it.

“Oh, of course,” Louis says, tugging Lottie to his side. His middle finger goes up, then hers goes up, and the photographer snaps a quick picture before she scurries away. Louis doubts if it’s even in focus.

He catches Harry’s eyes before Harry’s tilt up to the ceiling so he doesn’t look like he’s watching. His lips turn up at the edges. It’s the first smile Louis’ seen from him tonight.

\--

They leave well before sunrise, fulfilling their obligations down to the exact required second before they slip out through the front door. Louis had felt eyes hot on his back as they’d left, and he hadn’t turned around. They drop Lottie back at the Tomlinson den before they settle into their flat, Liam going off toward his room with a yawn-infused _night, Tommo_.

Louis stretches, wondering if he should have gone for a run before the night was over, work out some of the tension that’s settled in his shoulders from being on alert all night.

The moment he walks in his room, Louis nearly shifts out of his skin, a hand going to his chest once he realizes who it is. It’s not the first time he’s wished Harry had a scent. “Jesus, mate, lurking in the dark, that’s creepy as shit.”

Harry’s lips twist in amusement. “That’s sort of… what I do.”

“Well, you scared me half to death.”

Harry bites down on his bottom lip as though he were fighting a true smile. “Only half?”

“Shut up.” Louis lets the tension and anticipation of something about to happen build between them until he snaps. He's always the one that snaps, Harry'd wait a lifetime before moving first. Purely because he has that luxury. “Are you gonna come over here and kiss me, or what?”

Harry’s by his side in a blink, capturing Louis’ lips as instructed. Harry kisses deliberately as always, and Louis’ never had the confidence -- or maybe the utter lack of decorum -- to ask if that's because he's minding his fangs or he's just a very particular kisser.

His fingers dig into Harry’s chest, his claws extend just enough to leave angry red marks in their wake. They’ll disappear by sunrise, but Louis still likes the look of them, his marks that say Harry’s his. Louis works his tongue over them, pressing kisses all the way back up to Harry’s lips to claim them as his own again.

“You’re growling,” Harry mumbles against his lips.

“Yeah?”

“It’s cute.”

“It’s fearsome.”

Harry holds up two fingers, too awfully close to each other for Louis’ comfort, as if to say _eh, little bit_. Louis bites them, digs his teeth in enough that it would hurt if Harry could feel.

He chuckles, destroying Louis’ tough credibility just that bit further. “You gonna eat me?”

Louis tilts his head up, letting his lips brush on Harry’s fingers for a moment more before removing them altogether. “Tastes good.”

“Really? Thought Dead Inside wasn’t your _aesthetic_.”

Louis shoves at Harry’s chest, and if he wasn’t as strong as Harry, Harry wouldn’t stumble back as he does. “I knew you were mad about that. It was just a bit of banter, love.”

“I can take a joke,” Harry says, petulantly, his eyebrows furrowing.

Louis softens in the next moment, gathering Harry back up in his arms. He wouldn’t mean any of it, not a single word, not these days. It’s about appearances. It’s about his pack knowing Louis’ got quite the mouth on him and if he’d ever snapped it shut, he’d give himself away.

The first time they'd met, properly, Harry dug a silver bullet right out of his chest. He’d found Louis in an alleyway and dragged him out of the rain. His fingers shook and his face was wrenched in fear as he held Louis’ life in his hands. Louis had never seen that level of emotion on Harry’s face, not even in the heat of a battle, he’d thought -- but then remembered he’d never seen Harry in a battle.

He cleaned Louis’ wounds and washed his hands instead of lapping up the blood to sate himself. Louis hadn't understood for a long time. Every time he’d turn around, Harry was there watching. Maybe waiting for something, like a weakness to exploit. But Harry wasn’t doing any of that. Harry apparently just wanted to shag him.

At some point, it stopped being hate sex and was just. Sex. And then more than that. And then the 400-year-old silver cross around Harry’s neck suddenly got swapped out for a platinum one and Louis bought black out curtains. And then Louis had Niall rework his room’s wards to let Harry in, even when he didn’t have express permission. Affection gathering like a slow leak until there was so much gathered it’s something bigger now, something all encompassing.

There’d be hell to pay if anyone found out.

He thinks back to what Liam had said a few hours ago, wondering if at any point he’s been charmed by Harry. That Harry’s just been winning his trust to turn it back on him. Cunning and politics are too often their way, turning their noses up to the brutish wolf violence like they’ve not ripped wolf hearts out by the bulk.

Maybe Harry’s charming him now, his lips pressed to Louis’ neck where he can feel how fast and sure Louis’ heart beats for him. Louis hates himself for even entertaining the thought, but the second he does, he can’t shake it. And his mouth speaks before his brain catches up to it.

“If I had kissed you tonight in front of the stiffs, would you have pushed me away?”  

Harry’s face falls like he’s disappointed. “Not tonight, please.”

“Would you have dressed me up in a suit and had me feed you blood? Would they have known the difference?”

Harry cups Louis’ face desperately, like his fingers are pressing sincerity into his skin so Louis knows he means it. “Louis, you're just not some. _Thrall_.”

“That fucking word,” Louis bites.

“You know I don't --”

“Of course you don't,” Louis says with a sardonic laugh he can’t quite help. “Harry Styles, the lone honorable vampire, poster child for mortal rights.”

Harry looks pained, a rare moment of thick emotion painting his face. “Don't. Don't make fun of me.”

Louis apologizes. He reflexively reaches for acid before he reaches for honey. He's had to.

“I'm trying,” Harry says.

“I know.”

It’d gone against all of Louis’ best instincts to believe Harry, even from the very start, even as Harry saved his life. Harry’s fighting everything he’s been born and raised with, they both are, and it’s a hard-fought battle.

“You know what you do on the full moon. You don’t hunt sheep in the city, _love_.”

“Harry, I know. I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have said.”

But they’re not the only ones who hunt or kill, the wolves. There’s few rules in the war -- the treaty for All Hallows’ Eve, the protection of pups until they come of age, the swift punishment for mortal collateral damage. Louis thinks about it and his stomach twists. Lottie’s come of age. He wouldn’t see her battle a day in his life, not if he could do something about it.

He hates vampires, he’s spent his whole life hating them, spent his whole evening fighting a shift because he’d felt threatened by them. But it also just so happens that he loves this one. That’s worth the rest of them, that’s worth peace.

“We’re not oil and water, Harry, we could end this. Our packs wouldn’t have to fight. We wouldn’t have to sneak around in the darkness.”

Harry lifts an eyebrow.

“Okay, well, still in the darkness, but we wouldn’t be trapped in my room. I’d wear you on my arm around your goddamn ballroom. My pack would scent you as one of our own.”

“Louis, it’s. Impossible,” Harry says. It sounds like it hurts him to admit it.

“It’s not. My alpha will talk to your queen.”

Harry’s face twists. “Your alpha’s weak.”

Louis growls, an involuntary response at the slight. But he knows that’s the truth. Louis hasn’t fought for nothing, not up their ranks, not in their war. He knows what it means to protect his family, to protect Harry, and he’d go all the way up the chain for them. “Then I'll challenge him.”

Harry doesn’t argue that fact. He’s well aware of what Louis is capable of. “My sister will ascend -- ”

“Not for another century, Harry. In the meantime, how many of us die waiting for her to end it? You’ve said as much yourself.”

Harry closes his eyes, he remembers. “What are we even fighting for?”

“For nothing. For the belief that there’s a wall between us that can’t be climbed. But we’ve done it, the two of us, we could show them.” Louis stops to brace himself before he says, “Niall could -- ”

“Niall is neutral ground, you don’t pull him into this,” Harry attempts to interrupt.

Louis soldiers through anyway, not one to be bulldozed. “He could bind our souls, then they’d have to -- ”

Harry turns away from him, lacing a hand through his hair. He broods for a few moments and Louis lets him. He purses his lips and lets himself be interrupted this time. This one gets Harry the worst and there’s nothing his poor little vampire heart can do but stand alone and be dramatic about it until he’s ready.

Eventually Harry answers quietly, “I don't want to argue about my soul.”

They have played this game before and it never ends pretty. But. They breed life even in death, the vampires, they have families, they have lives, and Louis has to believe there’s a soul in there. Maybe not in all those frigid bastards, but he feels something in Harry when he presses him close to his chest. There’s a warmth within. Even if Harry doesn’t believe it.

“It’s nobody’s business who I love,” Harry mumbles. “It’s enough that I love.”

“That’s -- it doesn’t work like that for me.” Louis reaches for him again, pulls him close enough that Harry can’t help but look at him. Louis’ tried to explain before, but to someone like Harry, to what he is, they don’t understand. Them vampires, they can live in solitude for a thousand years and never think a thing of it, but not Louis. Never Louis. “It’s pack, I need you -- Harry, it hurts. It hurts that you haven’t run with us.”

They couldn’t tell Harry no, not if they were bound together, they couldn’t keep him from running, from joining the pack. It’d be Louis’ right, and they’d be cornered. They’d have to find peace. He hates the idea of having to twist relationship into something everyone has their nose in. But if that’s what it takes.

Too much passes through Harry’s face for Louis to translate before Harry says, “Okay.”

Louis puts his fingers through Harry’s hair this time, smoothing out the anxious mess Harry’d left it in. “You’re my _mate,_ for god’s sake.”

“Okay.” Harry kisses him, deliberate as ever. “We’ll see Niall after sunset.”

“Wait. Really?”

Harry smooths his fingers gently down Louis’ cheek. “Yes, really. I won’t see you in pain, especially if I’m the cause. It’s. It’s time.”

Louis grins. “You’re gonna werewolf marry me?”

Harry grins back, big enough it takes over his whole face. It’s not one of the light smirks he wears when he’s being a true vampire. It’s one of the proper ones, one he saves just for Louis. “You’re gonna vampire marry me?”

Louis feels his heart stutter at the thought, knows Harry can feel it too. The thought lights him up, and he knows anyone would be able to smell him on it. He trusts by the look on Harry’s face, by the weight of his hands on Louis’ body that he feels the same. He wonders if he’ll be able to scent Harry as he can his pack once they’re bound together. Then there wouldn’t be any barriers left between them.

“Yes, but I expect a big ring.”

“We do have a family ring, passed down through the generations,” Harry says thoughtfully, his eyes going distant like maybe he’s trying to remember where he’s last seen it. Or when he’s last seen it.

“Of course you do,” Louis laughs. Vampires are true hoarders at heart. “I’ll take it.”

“Shit, it’s silver.” Harry looks so genuinely distressed by that fact, Louis kisses him.

Kisses him and kisses him, the promise of the future in each press of his lips. Kisses him with the sudden knowledge that he’d have asked Harry even without trying to broker a peace on the back of their souls bonding as one. Kisses him like he knows there’s not a moment’s worth of uncertainty left in his body about Harry.

\----

 


	2. Chapter 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> a little drabble, takes place before the first chapter.

Louis’ bleeding out on the street, wondering if this is what finally gets him. It isn’t the bullet that’ll kill him, but the silver it leaks into his body, infecting his blood like a virus.

He lost control of his legs some ten minutes ago, fell hard onto the wet pavement and started pulling himself along with his arms. He’s not sure where he means to go. The trail of blood he leaves along the street could be scented by his pack just as easily as it could by the bloodbags. He slumps half in a gutter, rain coming at him from all sides, beating endlessly at his face like some weird form of torture, like rubbing salt into the wound.

At least he’d taken three of them down with him. 

His eyes slip shut though he’s struggling to stay awake, like he would as a kid, fighting sleep to get a glimpse of Santa Claus. He’s losing, slowly, consciousness dripping out of him like a leaking faucet. Until there’s a hand trailing lightly across on his face. Something gentle that guides him up until he’s flying. 

He’s flying up and out of the rain, limp in spite of whatever strength carries him until he finds the ground again. There isn’t much he understands but the light within him fading. The pull of the pack weakens, and with it his strength and focus. There’s a hand trailing smoothly down his face again, he thinks, the delicate touch of his ancestors to lead him onto whatever lies next. 

His mouth falls open easily when prompted, lips tracing delicately over what feels like ice. His mouth floods with something like nectar. It tastes sweet for a moment, then electric, and the moment his body processes it, he’s jolted awake. 

Reality smacks him hard with too many truths to handle at once -- he’s inside, in what looks to be a restaurant kitchen. His shirt is ripped open, exposing the bullet wound in his chest that oozes silver-laced blood onto the metal counter. His lips are pressed to a sliced wrist and his mouth is coated in blood .Harry Styles’ blood.

“Bastard,” Louis forces out, jerking his head away to spit what he can back in his face.

“Do you want to die?” Styles snaps. He doesn’t even flinch as speckles of his blood sprinkles his face. He walks away.

Louis thinks for a moment,  _ maybe _ , if this is the cost, if poisoning himself with vampire blood is his only medicine. If asked, he’ll vehemently how good it tastes, how it warms his veins, how it somehow manages to bring him back to life. 

He doesn’t have enough strength to find his wolf and shift to escape. He’s stuck here, at Harry’s mercy. He’s never known Harry to fight, only knows him through his sister, the future queen, but maybe this is what Harry does. Torture, behind closed doors.

Harry comes back with a clean face and a long, thin knife. Louis loses it, snarling and snapping at him in a surge of life-preserving energy. He claws Styles right down the chest, tearing his shirt and his skin open. 

Styles hisses, grabbing at the wound and taking a step back. “Fuck -- will you just --  look, I’m trying to  _ help you _ , will you calm down?”

Louis growls again, keeps his claws out just in case, and eyes him.

“I’m going to try to, like, get the bullet out, okay?”

Louis watches him, carefully, his chest rising up and down as he struggles to keep his breathing steady, but the harder he breathes, the more the hole in his chest seizes and oozes blood.

“Here,” he says, offering Louis a wooden spoon. “You’ll want something to bite.”

He nearly presses the spoon into Louis’ mouth before Louis reluctantly opens his mouth to clench down on the spoon. Louis will probably break it with any pressure applied to it, but maybe it’s the thought that’s supposed to count. Unless that thought is Louis is a weak wolf.

Styles touches around the bullet hole, his fingers tracing the blood for just a few seconds. Louis doesn’t know what he was playing at, trusting Styles to help him. The way he’s shaking, he’s two seconds from devouring Louis on the spot.

Styles stops and squeezes his eyes shut, presses his mouth shut even harder. When they open again, his eyes are green. Louis didn’t know vampires could have green eyes.

Then he digs in the knife. Louis screams. He pulls on his wolf for strength and finds nothing there. It lays silent within him, keening, halfway to death. His screams shift to growls, which shifts to whimpers, and there’s nothing he can do to save himself. 

It’s not right, leaving his life in Harry Styles’ hands. Bleeding out on the street hurt less than this.

Styles prises the hissing bullet out, finally, and the wooden spoon snaps in Louis’ mouth. It clatters onto the table next to him, so small, so fucking deadly. But even as it’s gone, there’s still heat in Louis’ veins, eating at him from inside. 

When he looks up at Styles, he’s surprised to find him looking stressed. Almost like he’s going to cry. Although Louis knows that’s absurd. Vampires can’t cry.

“The silver’s spread too much, I can smell it all through your blood,” Styles says softly, and he sounds sorry about it. “There’s not -- I can’t -- I’ll need help.”

Louis groans in a way he hopes Styles takes to mean,  _ don’t bring me to any fucking covens, death first.  _ But Styles gives no indication that he understands.

“Stay here. I mean it.” He follows it up with a firm point of his finger.

Louis grunts out, “Not a -- fucking dog.”

“Stay,” Styles repeats and disappears.

Moving his own head seems to require something of a miracle, but he does it. Turns and turns until he can get his whole body to move with him, and then gravity takes care of the rest.

Louis hits the ground with a killer smack, one that would wrench another scream from him if he weren’t so focused on being quiet. He’s not going to die here, not on this kitchen floor, he wouldn’t dare give the vamps the satisfaction. 

Styles finds Louis on the floor, crawled halfway to the door, and he has the audacity stand above Louis with his arms on his hips and look disappointed. “You are -- genuinely terrible at listening.”

“So I’m told,” Louis says with great difficulty and flumps back onto the floor. 

Styles scoops him up, one arm under his legs, one around his back, and Louis has to fight the urge to twist out of his arms. He weighs his options -- death or complete humiliation, and it’s a hard fucking argument, from both sides.

He lets himself be maneuvered into a car, something sleek and expensive looking, purely because Louis would rather like to bleed all over his leather seats.

Styles takes them to the witch’s house, parks and carries Louis right up to the door. He hangs on the bell, ringing at it and ringing at it, until Niall’s voice comes from nowhere, but also maybe an intercom of sorts. 

“S’the middle of the fucking night,” Niall snaps.

“That’s usually when things tend to happen on our end. Open up.”

The door opens, Niall’s on the other end looking a combo of sleepy and pissed until he sees the two of them. Then he goes straight to just pissed.

“Harry, what the fuck did you do?”

“I didn’t do anything,” Styles says defensively, pressing Louis closer to his chest as though he means to protect him. 

Louis doesn’t understand him. Hardly understands anything at all at this point, but most particularly Harry Styles -- what he’s doing, what he’s about. They’re not meant to do this, save each other’s lives. They’re meant to end them.  But Styles has nealy moved heaven and earth to save him, risked his own life. Because if his coven caught him with a wolf in his arms, they’d put him to death. 

Styles rests him gently onto a cot in Niall’s lab. Louis whispers, “Styles -- ”

“Call me Harry. Please.” He pats at Louis’ shoulder, the one that isn’t close to the bullet wound. “Actually, don’t call me anything because you should probably just rest.”

He moves away to join Niall in whatever nonsense he’s cooking up. Louis’ never seen Niall at work -- he’s only ever been over for a game or two of Fifa, but Niall wears the same look of concentration kicking Louis’ arse as he does trying to save Louis’ arse. 

“Have him drink this. Don’t let him shift.”

Harry looks down at the cup of steaming liquid. “I gave -- he’s got my blood in him -- ”

“He’ll be fine. In fact, this might help that too. Good idea.”

Harry leans in close to Louis, his lips lightly brushing Louis’ ear as he whispers, “You hear that? He said good idea.”

“Fuck off,” Louis tries to say, but Harry takes that opportunity to pour the potion into his mouth. 

It goes down thick and burning, nearly as bad as the silver, but it’s the kind of thing that’s meant to save Louis’ life. He wishes it were sweet, like Harry’s blood, and then thinks -- this must be it. He must be truly dying if he were wishing for Harry’s blood. 

“Louis, are you with me?” Niall says, appearing over him suddenly.

Louis nods.

“This is, ehm, this is gonna hurt a lot. Please don’t kill me, okay?” He places his hands on Louis’ chest as Louis’ breathing starts to go double time again. 

Harry grips his right hand tightly and Louis looks over to him instead. “You feel this? I’m here. Focus on this right here.”

Louis puts all of his concentration toward squeezing Harry’s hand so hard it could break, though he’s not strong enough. His claws dig in deep, slicing through Harry’s pale skin until blood beads up and over, streaking down Harry’s wrist. 

Harry doesn’t let go, through any of it. 

Louis fades fast, his mind being pulled from him by the pain, and soon enough all he knows before his world goes black is Harry doesn’t let go.

\----


	3. Chapter 3

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> a little drabble, takes place after the first chapter.

Louis doesn’t miss the way their eyes keep flicking to their goblets with disdain, as though they would rather starve than drink blood that wasn’t fresh. It’s his den now, this cold and formal manor Harry calls his home, and he will serve whatever he bloody well pleases.

For all their frowning, they haven’t looked at him once, averted their eyes as soon as they walked in, went into their odd deep bows. Not that Louis wants to scent them as he would his pack. They’ve not got scents, not even the general sense of decay that comes with being the cold, dead bastards they are. 

They ask their questions to Harry and Harry defers to Louis and Louis refuses to answer and Harry answers for him and they nod appreciatively. It’s an ugly circle and Louis would send them off if he’d had his choice. But a choice left them long ago. 

Louis extends a claw and runs it down the table, leaving a long scratch along the mahogany in his wake. This table is probably centuries old, perhaps a personal gift from a monarch to appease the coven’s bloodlust. Good.

Harry just stares at him from the other end, not even the corner of his mouth twitches. But Louis knows, he can feel it deep within his chest. Harry’s absolutely pissed at him. Good.

Louis knows what he must look like to them, a boy king sprawled carelessly in his chair, picking at his food with his head braced on the palm of his hand. Unfit to be the alpha, unfit to associate with the brother of the future queen, unfit to have ended the war. But they wouldn’t dare challenge him. They know what his teeth have done, can do. 

The worst of it is Harry looks frigid among them, straightening his back and taking the light from his eyes, just to match them. That’s who he thinks he needs to be in order for them to take him seriously. To prove he’s no different than the rest of the vampires, and that means he deserves their respect.

People who know Harry know better., they know it’s a facade. Louis has to keep telling himself that, this perpetually disinterested shell of a being sitting in front of him isn’t his mate, it isn’t the one whose soul he’s bound himself to for the rest of their days. 

But he’s starting to wonder if Harry remembers that. It’s been months since he’s seen Harry smile.

Louis stands, suddenly, and slides his plate away from himself. The bloodbags look over then, their eyes wide with confusion at the interruption before they scramble up out of their seats, a half-hearted display of the respect he should be shown. Harry remains seated.

“Pack emergency.” Louis gestures to his head, figuring they don’t know enough to argue that he’s not got a psychic link to the other wolves in his pack. 

The steely glare Harry shoots across the table says he knows exactly what Louis’ doing. He rounds the table to Harry’s side, presses in until he can capture Harry’s lips in a kiss. It’s not warm, it’s not genuine. It stakes a claim -- Harry is his and he is Harry’s and there’s not a goddamn thing anyone can do about it now. Harry kisses him back, but it’s perfunctory. Deliberate in the wrong way.

“Gotta run,” Louis says, patting at the table and surveying the horrified looks he’s being given by their two guests. “Enjoy your breakfast.” 

He doesn’t look back at Harry, not even the once, just shoots for the back door of the manor, stripping clothes as he goes and tossing them onto the floor. He twists and shifts as soon as his bare feet hit the grass. He runs.

They look at him different now, even his pack. Some of them like he’s tainted, some of them like he’s a god. He’s managed to snare himself a vampire, found one with a soul to bind himself to. It’s an unnatural union, and they tried to kill him for it. So he challenged his alpha and won, and if he thinks real hard about it, he can still taste the old man’s blood in his mouth.

They’re a symbol now, for peace, for the union, for the end of the war. If only the rest of them knew, they haven’t touched each other sincerely in months. Weighted down as they are by responsibility, there’s a sense of obligation in their affection in full view of Harry’s coven and Louis’ pack. And when the eyes are off them, there’s nothing. They’re exhausted, playing their parts, that when the curtains finally fall, they have no energy to give anything else.

Louis can’t live like this. He can’t douse his thoughts, his actions, his love in politics. He can’t scent out what’s real anymore. 

His legs nearly give out, just when he reaches the clearing. He’s far from it now, Harry’s manor is on the far side of town, in the old vamp territory, and they’d never dream to approach the wolf’s forest. It’s a long journey, one that’s worked out the twisting in his stomach by nature of pure exhaustion. He rounds the clearing a few times, sniffing out the best bit of grass, before he curls up.

The smell of incoming rain is thick and calming in the air, the lazy sway of his forest rocks him to sleep. He dreams of Harry, but Harry was nothing like a dream.

\--

Even with his eyes closed, he knows Harry’s there. He can feel their bond pulling at him, like a string’s been wrapped around his soul and goes taut whenever they’re too far apart. It’s not like being able to scent him, it’s something -- something more, a vital part of his very being. He only hopes Harry can feel it too.

Louis opens a lazy eye and watches Harry sink onto the grass next to him, propping his knees up so he can settle his arms on them. He’s tense so the bond is tense.

They used to sit like this, when they’d come out here to be alone, Louis shifted and draped over Harry’s chest, Harry’s hand mindlessly trailing through Louis’ fur. They didn’t ever need to talk, they just needed to be. 

“We need to talk, please,” Harry says quietly. 

Louis nearly refuses, figures if he stays a wolf, he won’t have to hear any of it. But maybe they’ll have it out this time. It’s not like Harry to want to talk first, he’d rather bottle it all up and store it some place Louis will never find it.

He shivers out of his fur and into his skin, stays stretched lazily on the grass.  

Harry sheds his coat, this soft expensive thing that could feed a den for a month. He hands it over, and Louis takes it and spreads it on the grass under him. Nearly smears dirt down it, just to see what Harry’d do. He always wants to provoke some kind of response from Harry, just to prove Harry’s alive.

He settles on top of the coat and looks up at Harry expectantly. It’s Harry’s show, it’s always Harry’s show.

“You embarrassed me tonight.”

Louis sours immediately, a growl almost tearing through his throat at that, the expectation that he should behave well enough to impress a few vampires. “I’m the alpha.” 

“Then act like it,” Harry snaps before closing his eyes like he needs to calm down. “They came to seek your guidance.”

That’s rich, Louis’ guidance. A vampire would never defer to a wolf, regardless of the treaty. “Is that why they were directing all of their questions to you?”

“They quarrel with your pack.”

“Our pack,” Louis corrects.

Harry looks over at him, and at least he looks stricken. It’s their pack now. Louis leads it, Harry’s run with them, each of them have scented him as their own, which is more than Louis can say for Harry’s fucking coven. 

“They’re trying,” Harry says.

“When are they going to start  _ doing _ ?” 

Harry’s jaw tenses. “We’re the only ones who’ve done it, and even then it took you the better part of a year to look at me when we were in bed together.”

Louis’ never going to live it down, it’s always going to hang over them. He’d called it hate sex, but it wasn’t always because he’d hated Harry. That had faded over time, withered under the power of Harry’s smile, the way he looked at Louis like he was something precious. Louis had hated himself, for wanting it, for shifting his whole perception of reality to fit Harry in it. Then that had faded too.

Harry with Louis was always at odds with Harry with anyone else, and that had meant something to Louis. Before, when Harry would be aloof to everyone but Louis, Louis used to think he was special. He’d gotten a view into who Harry was. But now that line is too blurred, his vision is obscured, and Harry brings that aloofness into their home when no one’s looking, into their bed. 

“Now look where we are,” Louis says, shifting his eyes to the sky. 

“Where are we?”

“Broken.” The word constricts Louis’ throat, runs hot through his veins like silver, poisoning just with the thought of it. Whatever it was that made them work once, it’s been snapped into a hundred pieces, too indistinguishable to be put back together.

“Louis.” Harry sounds broken too.

“You don’t touch me,” Louis says. “And when you do, it feels like you’re fucking me to prove a point.”

“What point is that?”

“That we’re good enough for them.”

Harry grows quiet, the kind of quiet that lets Louis know he’s right. That Harry can’t think of anything clever to say, no deflection, no argument against. Iit makes Louis feel like he’s won, it makes Louis feel like he has to keep fighting.

“You used to not give a shit about what they’d say. I dunno what the fuck happened there, but it’s killing us.”

Harry’s still in that dangerous way he can be. People who don’t know better would think he’s doing nothing at all, but Louis knows better. He’s calculating in that way that drives Louis crazy. Louis just acts, with his nose, with his eyes, with his guts. He’s driven by instinct first, sometimes to his own detriment, which is what has the vamps calling them animals. But it keeps him agile, it keeps him fighting to the last, not paralyzed by indecision. 

That’s the problem with those vampires coming to seek Louis’ opinion. They spent too much time analyzing the wolves’ motives to know how to talk to them. Took the smallest sniffs as affronts, read too much into it. They’re political, so they expect everyone to approach them as such. That’s not exactly a wolf’s style.

He waits for Harry to finish calculating, because Louis’ certain the maths will come out on his side. He waits because Harry doesn’t make him wait often. 

“I don’t know what I’m doing,” Harry admits slowly, painfully. “I’m -- I’m trying.”

“I know you are. That’s the problem. You’re spending so much time in your bloody head, you’re not doing anything.” 

“There’s a lot riding on this. On us. If we take one misstep, the whole treaty could fall apart as it stands.” 

“We’re falling apart Harry, fuck the treaty.” Louis sits up, reaches over to rest a hand against Harry’s neck, waits for Harry to place his hand over Louis’. 

Harry would carry the weight of the entire world on his shoulders if no one was paying attention. He’d shoulder it all so quietly you wouldn’t even know he’s done it, looking calm all the while. But Louis won’t let any of them drown him, he won’t let them turn Harry into something he’s not. 

They’re not gods, untouchable by anger or sadness or fear or frustration. They’re not symbols, perfect in construction and execution. They’re just two idiots bound by choice, not fate. To twist them into anything more than that would break them -- has broken them.

“I miss you,” Harry says, so quietly the words disappear on the wind. 

Louis noses at him, goes looking for that scent that isn’t there, but it slackens their bond anyway. “I miss you too.” 

“I’m going to do better,” Harry promises. “You can’t just get mad at me. You have to talk to me. If you -- you never keep quiet about anything. Why haven’t you said anything about this until now?”

Louis closes his eyes. He can picture his mum, standing over a shattered vase, hands on her hips, scowl on her face, telling Louis,  _ this is why we can’t have nice things _ . He can picture himself, standing over the shattered remains of their relationship, surrounded by a bristling pack and a venomous coven, telling Harry,  _ this is why we can’t have nice things.  _

“I dunno, I think. Maybe part of me thought we deserved this. We could have everything we wanted, but it came at a price.” These things don’t happen to Louis -- he doesn’t get so lucky as to fall in love, he doesn’t get so lucky as to keep Harry at his side. Monsters don’t get to take steps toward normal, it’s too good to be true.

“I won’t pay it,” Harry says sincerely. “You’re right -- I’ve been paying that price for too long.” 

“Paying out the nose, love.” They’ve found peace for their pack, their coven, and it’s about time they get a slice of peace of their own. 

Harry presses in closer and closer, whispers close enough to Louis’ lips that he might as well be kissing them already, “Can I kiss you?”

“You never have to ask, you can just -- ”  _ Do it _ is the end of the sentence that gets swallowed up by Harry’s lips against his, gentle and certain and breathtaking. 

\----

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> this is it for this story, i believe. thank you kindly for reading.

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you very much for reading. If you need me, I'm [here](http://wickershire.tumblr.com).


End file.
